Free financial calculators for NAFCU members.

News

Krebs: P.F. Chang’s breach may have lasted 9 months

B. Dan Berger

June 19, 2014 – Krebsonsecurity.com reported Wednesday that the credit-card breach P.F. Chang’s Chinese Bistro disclosed just this month may date back to September 2013.

It is today six months since news of the Target breach – one of the largest breaches of consumer data in history – and breaches continue to be reported at a rate of about one per month. NAFCU President and CEO Dan Berger reiterated the need for national data security and breach notification standards.

“For the sake of America's economy and consumers, we must take steps to make sure consumer financial information is safe from cybercriminals,” said Berger. “We urge Congress to hold retailers to the same strict standards of data security and breach notification that financial institutions must adhere to.”

Wednesday's Krebs report focuses on a notification from Visa to a bank noting that hundreds of the cards it issued had been exposed in a breach dating back to last Sept. 18. The bank, Krebs notes, “had purchased more than a dozen cards sold from an underground store that’s been exclusively selling cards stolen in the P.F. Chang’s break-in, and every one of those cards was listed” on the alert, which was sent June 17.

Krebs says that if all 211 of P.F. Chang’s locations were affected, this breach “is likely to have impacted more than 7 million cards.”